Noel

Foam hot wire cutters has arrived, a supply of foam insulation board and plaster cloth ready to start work on embankments and sections of landscaping over the Christmas break. GMs - detailing yet to be added after speakers installed. I have become a fan of operating GM pairs - consists Newest arrival 'Dargle River' Hopefully the background of this photo will look a little better in a few weeks time when its greened up a little.

Well I have to eat my words. Christmas came early as Mrs Clause bought me a lovely MM Grahams Resprays 222 "River Dargle" in Green and Grey livery. Living in Co Wicklow it had to be "Dargle River" in that livery, but had the "River Shannon" been in Green/Grey I would have jumped at that. Very pleased with Graham's weathering on this loco. I'm still not a big fan of the real 201 class, but as a model it is superb especially in this livery for my taste buds, despite the fact it doesn't suit my 60s/70s coaching and freight inventory. However due to the pic below I feel the poetic license will allow me to run it with Mk2d's and Cravens as RPSI specials. I had to buy one example and won't being buying anymore, but really pleased with this one. It is a very very long loco, so future fleet extensions at Kingsbridge will hopefully be 071 and especially 141/181s which are just the perfect size and mix for the 'loco hauled' era I have such fond memories of. I just love running a pair of 141/181 as consists, they look stunning underway. PS1: I know they are Mk3s but at least it orange and green mixed. PS2: I will have to learn how to weather and tone down the orange roofs on my few mk2d's PS3: I hope Brian doesn't mind me reposting his superb photo

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Yes it is, for less than half that price you could buy a superb running newer version of the Murphy Model 201 with all wheel pickup and all wheel drive (e.g. €150-170), far superior to the poor Lima toy. http://www.themodelshop.ie/model-railways/irish-railways/irish-locomotives/murphy-models-class-201-diesel-8208-river-lagan-ie-enterprise-new.html

Enjoy. Wishing you success continuing this fine layouts development and much fun operating it.

In my humble experience Lima locomotives do not make good paper weights. That price seems totally daft. I wouldn't take one of those for free. Lima 201 v MM 201 = Lada v Audi

Rooting around the attic this evening I found this 1980s attempt at steam sound - budget sound, I mean really budget sound They were supplied with some Hornby train sets of the era. It sounds hideous, more suitable for a child playing with duple trains. But it got me thinking of how simple it would be to create a simple mobile phone app to play synchronised trains sounds on a few channels. I found one on app store called iTrain but it was very poor. I reckon a few tracks that could be played simultaneously. Passing train rail noise + wheel clack over joints Assorted Diesel Horns Assorted Steam Whistles Flange squeal Station background noises, people, announcements, etc Various Steam loco chuff chuff Assorted GM Diesels including manual notch up and down All this needed is about 30 looping sound files and an app to play them with touch gestures, or use camera on phone to detect passing models and auto play sounds!!!

Looks great. Very impressed with the new name plate above the cab windows. Microscopic work.

This is a great development. I wonder if they will also have one of the 201s painted in a matching livery, and if so might that be done here or in Scotland.

That is really excellent. May you have many happy hours operating your superb layout. Looking at the photos, it appears the layout may be portable and can fold back on itself for transport, is that so? Very clever design.

Thanks guys thats very useful. It will make a change from the trial and error mixing I had to suffer four decades ago.

'Black Vomit' gets my vote for the dull old super train livery, but at least they served proper food back then. A time long past when CIE catered for Business travellers. Now the 201s and MkIVs have an attractive livery but no proper catering. I guess the IR/IE tipex and black roof era combined decent food with decent livery. The old Galway livery might best be described as 'lego-like'. The flying snail green livery was perhaps the classiest.

Hi Folks This has probably been answered here before, but I failed to find threads on it using search. Is there a source for CIE tan colour enamel paints suitable for spraying? A Also a source for CIE logo broken wheel for wagons? Many thanks Noel

I think the guys would probably like a guide. Covering how to open parts of the loco, where to lube with greace and where to lube with oil, gears, shafts, service intervals for motor bushes, how to clean pickups and wheel rims and wheel backs, recommended materials, use of cradle, power clips to run bogies inverted in cradle for lube, cleaning, test, etc, bla, bla

Glad to hear it John. Do you mind me asking out of curiosity, which of the suggested possible fixes worked? Cheers, Noel

Absolutely S T U N N I N G It does not look like a model, instead it looks so utterly and authentically real. I love the colour tones you have used.

Enjoy. It took me a while to adjust to MRSGs "real drive", but it was really worth it. Would love to see a video clip when you are ready

Great idea. How easily does the roof come off MM Mk2 coaches? Somebody suggested to me that the most cost effective way of putting passengers in coaches was to buy assorted packs of folks standing, but cut off their legs and glue them onto coach seats as most seated figures might not fit under tables, or between tables and seating. This was aside from the cost savings compared to buying seated passengers. Has anybody tried this? I'm hoping to repaint the fluorescent blue seating in our cravens and place passengers in them over the Christmas holidays. I'd rather not reinvent wheels if possible.

And CIE's proper diesel loco livery

Ditto. Black CIE locos with tan band and white strips is my favourite era. What an absolutely fabulous layout. This is the period of Irish railways that most interests me. Just love the atmosphere and colour tone of your layout.

MM 141 + MrSoundguy Zimo sound decoder new version of 141 project Turn your volume up. Hope its ok to repost, posted before on the layout thread but thought it would be useful to post here as the video is mainly a MM 141 with Mr Soundguy supplied Zimo sound decoder. I'm really pleased with the sound on the 141 and the way the speaker was so easy to fit without needing to cut any chunks out of the loco chassis. The 'real drive' is a new way of driving a loco, but after a short period of feeling rather mixed about it, have now come to prefer this more realistic way of driving a loco and train. It is just so realistic. No more need for manual notching functions, it just happens intelligently and automatically. Learning to brake rather than just throttling back was new to me, but now that I've got used to it, I'd never go back to the throttle only way of driving one of these amazing MM locos. I love the way she coasts on approaches to stations or stopping points. Just like the real thing you have to plan your stopping distances. In the late 70s I used to have to build inertia DC controllers to simulate this method of stopping or slowing a train. I love it. EDIT: PS: Mod if I shouldn't have posted this hear and its for the supplier use only feel free to remove the post.

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Great scene. 201 central.

No prob just put it in the microwave for 2mins on medium power and it will enlarge